Around the block

The celebrity gardener James Alexander-Sinclair has fashioned a quirky oasis in a farmyard in Northamptonshire

James Alexander-Sinclair discusses his Blackpitts garden with Joe Swift and Cleve West

If James Alexander-Sinclair wants to go incognito, he takes off his hat. He
has been wearing the same broad-brimmed bushwhacker style since the 1980s,
and it has become a leitmotif, taking him through careers as a landscaping
contractor, garden designer, writer and television presenter.

The present model is proudly displayed on the dashboard as he picks me up from
Milton Keynes station. “They are very useful — they keep the sun and the
rain off, and are generally A Good Thing to Have,” he says.

We drive a few miles west to Blackpitts, in Northamptonshire, which
Alexander-Sinclair, 51, shares with his wife, Celestria, 47, a bridge
teacher, and son Maxim, 16. It is also where he writes his irreverent
gardening blog, blackpitts.co.uk.

Soon, though, he’ll have to think of a new name for his website, as they are
selling up. They are rattling around their eight-bedroom house now that
their older